Wireless charging is getting more and more popular now-a-days. You can see this technology it in your phones and even in AirPods. So, when we look at the usage rates, the numbers suddenly start to drop.
This is mostly because wireless charging isn’t truly ‘wireless’.
Your device needs to touch a charging pad, and that can be harder than just using a USB-C or Lightning cable.
But engineers at Aalto University have develop a new system.
As of now wireless charging requires a device to be place on a pad or dock, which isn’t much more convenient than wire charging.
Current wireless charging technologies use magnetic induction to transfer power over short distances, but this limits the range of the charger and the amount of power that can be transfer.
The efficiency of wireless charging decreases rapidly as the distance between the power source and the receiver grows.
That’s why researchers have working for some time to find a way to increase the range without sacrificing efficiency.
Engineers at Aalto University have create a new system that could allow for more efficient wireless power transmission over longer distances.
As it’s worth noting that this isn’t the work of a company like Apple or Xiaomi.
So, there isn’t a product you can buy in the near future.
In fact, there isn’t even a product at all.
The Aalto University team has merely develop a new dynamic theory.
And this is indeed a significant step and some tests have conduct, it is still only a research study.
So, it’s also good to remember that such studies are the foundation of all modern technologies.
The Aalto University team test the idea using two loop antennas, each 7.2 cm (2.8 in) wide.
By tweaking the currents in the antennas, they were able to suppress the radiation resistance in the loops and increase the efficiency.
Even when place 18 cm apart, the power transfer efficiency remain high at over 80%.
Nam Ha-Van, lead author of the study, Said :
“We wanted to balance effectively transferring power with the radiation loss that always happens over longer distances,”
“It turns out that when the currents in the loop antennas have equal amplitudes and opposite phases, we can cancel the radiation loss, thus boosting efficiency.”
You probably didn’t think that 18 cm was much, which isn’t really a big distance.
But as said, this is only the first step in technology and it is likely that it will near perfection in the future.
This could have a big effect on how we use our gadgets.
Especially when you consider that companies like Apple and Samsung have remove the charger from the box for some products like phones.
